[Brent Swain]

What is their excuse? Eyesore? Do they consider the Exon Valdes spill aesthetically pleasing to the eye? Do they consider the open pit mining of the oil sands , or the brown smog over most cities aestheticaly pleasing to the eyes ,or the lungs?<br /> Do they consider the lives of the thousands of people killed by the current energy use pattern disposable ? Do they consider their view more important than the lives of their children?<br /> Do they consider the environmental dammage done by current energy sources less important than their view? Do they consider wars fought over oil and the hundreds of thousands of innocent elders ,women and children killed by them, to be of no real significance when compared to the importance of their view?<br /> I find wind generators to be extremely graceful and aesthetically pleasing to both the eye and the lungs.Not so the alternatives.<br /> This brings the ultra myopic ,style over substance values of the consumer culture to new levels of insanity. These people are either incredibly short sighted , or as dense as plutonium.Whatever they may have to spend, their excuses and lobbyists should be totally ignored, with the utter contempt they deserve, for the health and future of all of us and our future generations.<br /> Brent Swain

[Marcarc]

You're forgetting the other option-they are rich.

[Dr Caleb]

NIMBY. Don't do coal, don't do nuclear, don't do hydro. Do Wind! But, Not In My Back Yard.<br /> <br /> <img align=absmiddle src='images/smilies/evil.gif' alt='Evil'> <br /> <br /> Do environmentalists even realize how they are tying everyone's hands? They are the problem they seek to cure.<br />

[Marcarc]

Riiiiiiight. A wealthy bunch of suburbanites oppose a wind farm and it's the "environmentalists fault". What in god's name makes anybody think people who live on Long Island are environmentalists? That's the dumbest thing I've ever heard. I'm an environmentalist, in fact I'm trying to get wind power IN my backyard. Are people dumb enough to believe environmentalists don't want wind power in their back yards? Please! Most wind power projects are nowhere near anybody's backyard, in case people haven't noticed, Canada is BIG, and the population lives in maybe 5% of the land space in the country. In PEI the people want TONS more 'in their backyard', in fact their government has been trying to get the feds to contribute some money so they can multiply by ten times IN thier back yard.

[Dr Caleb]

Cape Cod, Marcarc, not Long Island.<br /> <br /> And read the one line Footprints didn't quote from the article:<br /> <br /> "Other environmentalists and Cape Cod homeowners say they do not want the view spoiled or fishing grounds hurt."<br /> <br /> Cape Cod is where the 'Kennedy compound' is, Robert Kennedy Jr., the guy who famoulsly spouts 'Wind Power!' 'Wind Power!' until it's his view that is spoiled. Since he's been the hypocrite before, I assume he's part of the 'other environmentalists' category.

[Brother Jonathan]

We’ve had a miniature version of that debate in my corner of North America. In our case, there’s a former radar base on top of a mountain that’s surrounded by federally- and state-conserved mountainous wilderness area. The current owners of the ex-base want to install four wind turbines to see if it’s an economically viable proposition for the area; if it is, then they’d like to install twenty to thirty others over several mountaintop sites. (The economic rationale is that Vermont currently gets one-third of its electricity from a nuclear plant in the southeastern corner of the state, and another one-third is purchased from Hydro Québec. The current licence of the nuclear plant expires in 2012, and the contract with Hydro Québec phases out between 2012 and 2015. Neither source is currently guaranteed to be extended beyond these dates.)<br /> <br /> There has been considerable local opposition to establishing the four turbines on the ex-base, and a state review board recently found in favour of the opponents, since state law requires that energy-related projects won’t have “undue, adverse effects on aesthetics or scenic and natural beauty”. (I haven’t heard yet whether the ex-base owners plan to appeal the ruling or not.) I suspect that much of the opposition was indirectly due to the size of the turbines, since any structure over 200 feet (61 m) tall is required by federal law to have permanently attached strobe lights going night and day for reasons of aviation safety. (The proposed turbines with their rotor blades extended were 329 feet [100 m] tall.) My guess is that if they didn’t have always-on strobe lights, their “viewshed” impact could have been reduced enough to overcome the NIMBY factor.<br /> <br /> Efficiency-wise, the power produced by a wind turbine is proportional to the cube of the wind speed; since wind speed increases with height, it’s in the interest of a wind turbine owner to use as tall a structure as is feasible to maximise the power generated. Finding the balance between maximised return on investment and NIMBY will be the key to establishing wind power.<br /> <br /> Perhaps those environmentalists (as opposed to the local estate owners) mentioned in the Cape Cod article have reducing energy consumption as their primary goal, which might be why “no” and “NIMBY” are their tactical responses to establishing new energy sources?

[Marcarc]

Whenever media wants to be 'objective' they always say "other environmentalists". There are thousands of environment organizations, if they were protesting, their names would be attached. When we see an actual quote from this Kennedy guy who spouts 'wind power' until it's in his backyard then there's some credence to that. However, he is only one person.<br /> <br /> That's a frequent tool by mainstream media to make it look as though environmentalists can simply never be satisfied, that they are inconsistent, and illogical. That's rubbish of course, wind power often faces the NIMBY problem, but it's typically only where rich landowners are concerned that it's a problem. These people are NOT environmentalists. In fact, most of the big oil heavy hitters have homes on Cape Cod. <br /> <br /> In virtually every place wind turbines have been set up in Canada they have been welcomed. In Grand Manan, an island in NB where tourism is the biggest draw, their residents are ecstatic. The one problem was that the head of the bird club was asked for a presentation to the EIA and because he knew nothing about wind power was concerned about it's effects on the birding population.<br /> <br /> As far as state's go, you almost never hear a referendum vote to the public which simply asks the population how they want to manage their future energy needs-foreign purchases, nuclear, wind, etc. So you get instances where different organizations oppose facilities 'ITBY'. Those types of issues WOULD be overcome in an actual democracy where people can compromise, however, we tend to live in an 'eithor-or' society where some people have to lose for others to gain. <br /> <br /> As the above states, at least in the states these issues are resolved 'somewhat' out in the open. In Canada, the population has ZERO say in how these are worked out.

[Brent Swain]

I just heard on CBC that wind generators can cause problems with radar within a couple of miles. This could be a good arguement for putting them on mountain tops.<br /> Do any of you electronic whiz kids out there know of any simple solutions to eliminate radar interference caused by wind generators.<br /> Brent